As Predicted, Britain’s Burnham is Turning Against Israel.

I warned, ahead of him being elected the new British Prime Minister, that Andy Burnham would be worse that Keir Starmer for Israel and British Jews.

This was based on his affinity in serving under the notorious Israel-hating, Palestinian terror sympathizer, Jeremy Corbyn, as a Shadow Minister, plus a notorious policy statement written by Burnham barely two months before he was elevated to Downing Street that was viciously anti-Israel.

“The unbearable suffering in Gaza is a stain on our collective conscience. It is unacceptable that innocent Palestians, including children (always include the word “children” to garner additional emotional response) continue to be killed.

“We must do more to increase the pressure on the Israeli Government.” (No pressure on Hamas or Palestinian Islamic Jihad).

I know that many believe that at the start of Israel’s military operation in Gaza, may party did not act correctly, and for that I am sorry. Too often, our response was insufficient (as it certainly was on 7/10 and every day since when it came to Israeli civilian suffering after the uninvited mass invasion into Israel of a Palestinian death cult leaving thousands of Israelis dead, raped, tortured, or taken hostage by the people that Burnham is symapthizing with.)

And now we come to the crunch of Burnham’s anti-Israel threat.

“I fully supprot resitrictions on arms exoser licences to Israel to ensure that British bombs or ammunition are not used by the IDF in Gaza, or in the West Bank. We must do more.

“Israel continues to violate the ceasefire agreement and kill innocent Palestinians.

“We are witnessing an increase in violence by settlers in the West Bank and East Jerusalem, an the continued expansion of illegal settlements, which leads to the displacement of Palestinian communities.

“The Netanyahu government is clearly acting to make a two-state solution impossible. Therefore, we must do mre, including considering additional sanctions against those invlved in violence in Gaza, as well as steps to bank trade in products originating from illegal settlements.

“I was deeply shocked by what I have seen and read about the destruction on Gaza. More ans more evidence in accumulating indocating that war crimes may be been committed.”

By Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad perhaps no only against Israelis but their own people as evidenced by honest and neutral observers, including former British commander, Colonel Richard Kemp, who served in COBRA meetings in Downing Street and has been in Gaza over a dozen times during the war and has reported that the IDF ratio of civilian-combatant deaths is far lower than committed by British and American forces in their experiences of urban warfare.

Now P.M. Burnham is poised to announce a ban on trade with settlements in the Israeli-occupied West Bank.

The Prime Minister has already pledged sanctions against Benjamin Netanyahu’s government in response to controversial plans for thousands of new settler homes.

Mr Burnham is now considering a trade embargo within weeks. New sanctions on Israel would risk further harming relations, which have already deteriorated over Mr Netanyahu’s plans to construct homes in the E1 section of the West Bank.

Such a move would also cause a split in Labour ranks. Backbenchers have been divided on Middle East policy since the Oct 7 terror attacks and the war in Gaza.

Labour Friends of Israel has warned it would be impossible to ban trade from settlements only, making the plans a “de facto boycott of all of Israel.”

Mr Burnham and Ed Miliband, the Foreign Secretary, have drawn up a new sanctions regime that would stop the exchange of goods and services with Israeli settlements, Bloomberg first reported last week.

On Tuesday, a senior government source told The Times that Mr Burnham wanted to take a more “robust” approach towards Israel than Sir Keir Starmer, his predecessor, and suggested that he would sign off on a trade ban.

Downing Street insisted that reports on the measures it was looking to introduce were no more than speculation.

Mr Miliband has already hinted at further sanctions against Israel after Mr Netanyahu published a tender for the construction of the E1 project.

The plan would involve building 3,300 homes between Jerusalem and the Jordan border.

However, opponents fear that it would effectively cut the West Bank in two and prevent a contiguous body of land forming the basis of a viable Palestinian state.

Labour MPs have warned Mr Burnham against the proposal, saying it could spark a trade war with President Trump.

One Labour MP told The Times: “Our trade and diplomatic relationship with the US is fragile enough as it is. We shouldn’t be naive enough to believe we could sanction Israel and not face any economic and political consequences from the White House, Congress or states with anti-BDS [boycott, divestment and sanctions] laws.”

A former Labour minister also added: “There is a very big risk of Trump and the Israelis taking retaliatory measures. Our ministers need to weigh these risks very carefully before going ahead with gestures that might make their backbenchers and some voters feel better, but would not improve the plight of the Palestinians anyway.”

A diplomatic row broke out last week after Mr Miliband criticised Israel over the proposals, calling them “unacceptable” and claiming they would block hopes of a two-state solution.

Israel responded by saying that the Foreign Secretary’s “patronising” criticism of its West Bank plans had damaged Britain’s relationship with the country.

Gideon Sa’ar, the Israeli foreign minister, hit back at his counterpart, saying: “I reject outright the statement of the UK Foreign Secretary and the patronising tone of his words.

“The UK Government’s decision to damage the relationship between our countries is deeply unfortunate.”

Shortly before entering Downing Street last month, Mr Burnham pledged to impose further sanctions on Israel as he apologised for Sir Keir’s response to the Gaza crisis.

Speaking to the Guardian, the Prime Minister said that Labour “didn’t get it right” in its initial response to Israel’s military action.

More than 140 Labour MPs – equivalent to one-third of the Parliamentary Labour Party – have signed an open letter calling for a ban on trade with settlements.

Burnham is blind to the wholesale and illegal transfer of populations from parts of territories controlled by the Palestinian Authority into an area known as E1 which, according to the Oslo Accords of which Britain was a witness, would remain part of Israel until such a time as Palestinian Arabs deign to recognise and accept Israel and Israeli terroritories, something they have blatantly refused to do.
And in this area, which runs down the highway connecting Jerusalem to the Dead Sea north of the Israeli town of Maale Adumim, drivers can learly see the import of prefabricated structures to illegally house many hundreds of Palestinian peasants, their families and their goat herds and chickens.
All, let it be said, totally illegal under international law, namely the Oslo Accord.

Strategic Land Seizure: Regavim, the Israeli law NGO, contends that the Palestinian Authority (PA), often with foreign backing like European Union funding, executes a systematic plan to seize Israeli state land in Area C through unauthorized building, infrastructure, and agriculture.

Scale of Construction: Regavim reports tens of thousands of unauthorized Palestinian structures in Area C, arguing that this unmitigated growth creates irreversible facts on the ground and compromises Israel's security and sovereignty.

And yet, both Burnham and his Foreign Minister Milliband have been totally silent on this gross illegality.

Barry Shaw,
The View from Israel,
Israel Institute for Strategic Studies.

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